The final scene of The Dark Knight has Batman running from police fresh off of saving the city. He orders Commissioner Gordon to lie and place the blame for Harvey Dent's murder on him to preserve the district attorney's iconic image as a crusader for justice and prevent the public from knowing of Dent's murderous turn to Two-Face. Gordon explains to his son that Batman is:

"... the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not our hero. He's a silent guardian, a watchful protector. A dark knight."

Batman was willing to sacrifice his honor to protect the image of Dent, the hero Gotham needed. He understood the greater good outweighed public opinion of his alter ego.

In a Democratic Primary debate in October, Hillary Clinton labeled "Republicans" an enemy. She was blasted by right wing media and walked back the comment, which is understandable since her record makes it hard to imagine she considers the GOP an enemy. Clinton and her ilk have "fought" Republicans by compromising with them on issues in the hope that it would result in give-and-take that would pull both sides to the center. Instead, both parties have continually been pulled to the right as the GOP drags Democrats to a point that fracking, private prisons, trade deals, domestic spying, reduced banking regulations, voter restrictions, and lax gun laws are considered part of the "liberal agenda."

But assume someone did consider Republicans an enemy, and wanted to destroy the party. Many may picture Bernie Sanders, who has called out the establishment players in both parties for their ties to corporations and big-dollar donors. Sanders' idealism may prompt Commissioner Gordon to label him "the hero America needs, but not the one we deserve."

To really defeat the GOP, we deserve someone else.

Who has done more to destroy the Republican Party in the past century than Donald Trump has done in the past year?

Imagine going back in time two years and finding some people who'd like to see the Republican Party reduced to rubble. Ask them their wishlist of things they'd like to see headed into the 2016 general election. Many may have suggested things like seeing the Bush family's grip on power broken, or having the political futures of promising future party leaders (and likely presidential favorites) Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, and Chris Christie neutered. Someone might laughingly suggest, "I'd love to see party leadership having to stand behind a candidate who openly says Mexicans are criminals and find a way to justify it," but no one would realistically expect such a thing.

If they were to put their heads together and create a shoot-the-moon-level, comedically terrible candidate who would expose all the worst aspects of the GOP, they'd probably have that person:

• Claim to be religious while transparently having no understanding of Christianity.
• Insult women for their looks and menstrual cycles.
• Regularly contradict himself, often within the same sentence.
• Never offer a single policy detail.
• Openly court the white supremacist vote.
• Express little to no understanding of foreign policy.
• Express an incestuous attraction toward his daughter.
• Threaten endless military interventions while attacking veterans and surviving family of troops who died on the battlefield.
• Eat a taco bowl as outreach to Latino voters.
• Call for violence against racial minorities at rallies.
• Promise massive tax cuts guaranteed to destroy the economy.
• Boast about the size of his penis during a national debate.
• Name call his opposition like a six-year-old on a playground.
• Praise foreign dictators.
• Order the mother of a crying baby to get out of his rally.
• Dismiss violence committed by his supporters as "enthusiasm."

... and, more importantly, have every other Republican fall in line.

Donald Trump may not be our hero, but he's accomplishing more than progressives could ever ask of Hillary, Bernie, and Obama combined. And we hunt him like that other make-believe billionaire who inherited everything from his father. Because he can take it. He's a silent guardian--

Nope, I guess the silent bit is where the whole things falls apart...

Previously, Superman challenged Batman and Robin to figure out his secret identity, which necessitated his erasing his secret identity from their Batbrains with a Superbraineraser. Despite Superman's cheating and completely missing the point of his own challenge, Batman figured out he was Clark Kent in two days. This made Supes declare he could figure out Batman and Robin's alter egos in the same 48 hour time frame without using his superpowers.

So, what's his plan? To fly after Batman and Robin and learn the location of the Batcave... since apparently the ability to fly is not a "superpower" today.

But Batman is prepared for Superman's liberal interpretation of the rules.

Oh, shit! Batman don't play! This may all be in good fun, but Batman will fucking kill you, Supes!

Completely tapped for ideas, having exhausted all of one, Superman turns to Batman's playbook. The plan to find Superman's true identity kicked off with a public appearance, but the Dynamic Duo is to busy fighting murderous clowns and acid-scarred former district attorneys to waste time opening grocery stores.

But since Superman has no other fresh ideas, he stays up all night building a Batman Museum.Remember, crafting an entire building and creating and collecting enough Batman memorabilia to fill an entire museum overnight through the combined use of superspeed, superstrength, and flight are not superpowers.

While the mayor and various other Gotham officials arrange a hasty dedication ceremony and rezone the area where Superman dropped the building, the Last Son of Krypton shrinks himself down and goes to visit a bunch of other Kryptonians in Kandor. There, he borrows a Kandorian telepathic hound from a pet store.

Like bloodhounds follow scents, Kandorian telepathic hounds track their game by picking up on brainwaves. So to recap, Superman's plan is to do exactly what Batman did, only find an encephalograph that will run itself so he doesn't have to learn any technological mumbo jumbo.It's not very clear why Batman and Robin feel the need to escape their own ceremony, but considering they were able to tunnel their way out of a building that's only existed for a few hours and build a handy trapdoor to cover the exit, maybe Superman's speedy construction of the Batman Museum could be accomplished without superpowers after all.

The better strategy seems to be remaining in their superhero identities all day. If Batman and Robin remain at the ceremony, then go on patrol, and spend the evening in the Batcave defragmenting the Batcomputer's hard drive, Superman will never learn their true identities without snatching the masks off their faces. Of course, Batman has a reason for running away... to totally rub Superman's nose in his own ineptitude.Anticipating Superman's plan to boost his own plan, Batman anticipated that he should figure out a way to convert the encephalograph from a receiver to a transmitter. That's like turning your TV into a television station.

However, this scene raises so many questions. How close are Gotham City and Metropolis? I'd always assumed they were at least in different states. Looking it up, it appears that they are either on opposite sides of New York City or across Delaware Bay from one another. Either way, it's safe to assume they are at least a few miles apart. Since Kryptonian dogs gain similar superpowers to Kryptonian people when they arrive on Earth, how is it Batman and Robin are able to outrun Superman and the telepathic hound all the way back to Clark Kent's apartment? And how does Superman not recognize that the dog is leading him up his own stairs and into his own apartment until he actually opens the door? And once Superman gets shown up, why not turn it off and continue pursuit since Batman and Robin must be right around the corner?

Apparently, it's because he's plunged into a terrible super-depression.Superman gets so distracted by his inability to accept that anyone might be better at something than he is that he forgets what he's doing in the middle of a task that should take him about seven seconds and has to be reminded to stop a falling satellite from crushing a neighborhood.

Recognizing this as a genuine threat to humanity, Batman tells Robin he is concerned about Superman's mental state and tries to call the whole thing off.Superman starts to reveal that he's been visiting the Bureau of Vital Statistics because it holds a vital key to finding the Caped Crusader's secret identity, but is interrupted by a cartoonishly Hispanic man who asks "Super Hombre" to chase off the killer whales that are ruining his unnamed nation's fishing waters.

The next day, Batman and Robin find a mysterious golden dome in Metropolis. When they approach it, alarms go off. Superman steps out and explains that the alarm system is set to go off anytime anyone wearing a grey body suit with a blue cape and cowl or a red shirt with green panties and a yellow cape approaches. He escorts them inside and shows them a computer from the Bureau of Vital Statistics and explains that it's going through the 1960 Census data and will be able to determine Batman's true identity from that.

Batman and Robin have a brief sideways glance to one another and agree there's no way Superman can figure out their secret identities from census information, but Superman just laughs and warns them not to try to sabotage the computer while he's away on a top secret supermission since he will know if they come anywhere near the building... in their costumes...Unable to think of any possible way to foil a security system designed specifically to recognize the colors of their costumes, Batman and Robin have no choice but to bumrush the computer building in their civvies. The only thing missing are the "Hello, My Name is BRUCE" and "Hello, My Name is DICK" nametags. As they approach, however, they find that Superman wasn't on a secret mission at all but has been hiding inside with the computer waiting for Batman and Robin to take the bait. Presumably, in the hours that passed several banks were robbed and countless people perished and Lois Lane fell off three buildings and Jimmy Olsen drank a radioactive potion that turned him into a bunny rabbit and a handful of people grew concerned that Clark Kent had just vanished around lunchtime and never came back to the office.

Superman has a good gloat about how smart he is and how he's proven himself the equal of the world's greatest detective while Bruce and Dick "Aw, shucks" for all they're worth and curse themselves for falling into the oh-so-clever trap. But when Superman flies away to spin the Earth backwards and undo all the tragedy that's befallen mankind while he hid out waiting to surprise Batman, the Dynamic Duo breaths a sigh of relief that the contest is finally over.And thus the lesson: The only way to win with Superman is to let him beat you quickly so he stops wasting your fucking time.

Lots of love to Gregg Schigiel for the Bunny Olsen

My son is a terrible sport. He cheats at every game you play with him and when he can't cheat, he will announce abrupt changes to the rules. While in the midst of a pinfall while wrestling, you will be informed that you get zero points and he gets 5000 because you weren't allowed to use your arms. Footraces hinge not on the first person to arrive at a predetermined destination but on the youngest participant.

It's terribly annoying and everyone in the family has at one point or another told him, "I don't want to play with you. You are not any fun."

Of course, we can say this because my son is a six-year-old boy with the average size and strength of a six-year-old boy. Were he an alien with the strength to push the Earth out of orbit and the ability to shoot heat rays and radiation from his eyes, we'd probably change our attitudes.

A recurring theme in World's Finest stories is Superman deciding it would be fun to challenge Batman to some kind of contest or to pit himself against some other renowned figure and prove himself an equal. Unfortunately, any time Superman gets even a hint that he might lose--just like my son--he either changes the rules or pouts until he gets his way. And worse, he doesn't recognize the hollowness of the resultant victory.

Take for example World's Finest Comics #149's "The Game of Secret Identities."

Clark Kent gets a scare that his secret identity might be in jeopardy, not because the investigative journalist he chooses to spend every day sitting ten feet away from has finally nailed down another irrefutable piece of evidence proving he has god-like powers, but because someone left a flier under his door. Never one to take advertising lightly, Superman puts a chicken in his Ronco Rotisserie, sets it and forgets it, and flies to Gotham City where he breaks into the Batcave.

While the flier proved to be a false alarm, Superman explains to Batman and Robin that he's worried maybe someone could see through his true identity if they tried hard enough. He wants Batman, as the world's greatest detective, to see if he can figure out his alter ego.

The only problem is that Batman and Robin already know Superman is Clark Kent... but they don't have to! Superman--passively making it clear he's already decided Bruce Wayne is going to take him up on the offer--has brought along his Selective Amnesia-Inducer.Forget for a moment that Superman has just suggested zapping the world's greatest crime-fighting mind with a alien brain-erasing laser to satisfy a curiosity raised by a snake oil advertisement found on the floor. For a moment I want to focus on the example used to illustrate a typical Selective Amnesia-Inducer's success story.

What do you expect our sad Kryptonian friend up there to do as soon as he leaves the Selective Amnesia-Induction Center? I'm guessing it won't be too long before he calls his buddy Khal-Kar to suggest they grab a few Kryptonian ales or go see the new Lyla Lerrol flick, gets into an argument with the Widow Kar, and learns that his best friend suffered a tragic death that he knew nothing about. Yes. That's a much better outcome.

Batman and Robin agree to the Kryptonian mindwipe and set about trying to learn Superman's secret identity the very next day. At a media event, they hide an encephalograph in a news van and scan Superman's brain, figuring his brainwaves will be different from those of a human. But they get no reading whatsoever.Bear in mind that Superman's excuse for the potential riskof lobotomizing one of his best friends and one of history's greatest crimefighters was that he wanted to know if he might be tipping his hand and risking his secret identity. To learn what he claimed he wanted to know, he needed to continue on with his normal life and allow Batman and Robin free reign to discover his identity.

Instead, he's decided to make it a game of Show Up Batman! All he's proving is that if Lex Luthor loudly declares, "I am going to figure out Superman's secret identity through intense scrutiny and advanced technology," Superman has a few tricks up his sleeve. But unless he intends to allow his Superman Robots to take over all his superheroic duties moving forward, the entire exercise is pointless.

Batman, however, is nothing if not resourceful. He trails the Superman Robot back to the Fortress of Solitude and manages to break in only to find that Superman, who'd been hiding out there until the robot warned him Batman was coming, had removed all evidence that revealed his secret identity.What should be a lesson of "Don't keep wax figures of yourself in your civilian identity on a display that reads 'Clark Kent is Superman' in your publicly known hideout" instead becomes a "Fuck you, Batman" and a pat on the back for being sooooo clever.

That's when Batman pulls a little "Fuck you" of his own. He deactivates all the Superman Robots before leaving the Fortress of Solitude, forcing Superman to make an actual appearance at another media event the next day. There, Batman finally gets the unique brainwave scan he wanted and is able to track Superman back to an apartment building in Metropolis.Superman--again, knowing someone is trying to expose his secret identity through encephalographic means--alters his brainwaves, preventing Batman and Robin from getting absolute proof of his secret identity. So, Batman presses forward with the pointless exercise and invites the four men to a place where he can hook the up to the encephalograph and monitor their brainwaves while they watch a slide show of Batman and Superman's varied adventures.Is the encephalograph really necessary at this point? Superman must be one of these four men, but which one? The jug-eared horseface, the one with the mustache, the bald one, or the one who looks exactly like Superman wearing glasses and a business suit?

Despite the answer being pretty obvious, Batman goes ahead with the experiment and while Superman masks his brainwave patterns for a while, his interest in hearing Batman say nice things about him during the slideshow overwhelms his cautiousness and exposes him.

Having been found out within 48 hours despite not really playing fairly, Superman listens to his wounded ego and declares he can learn Batman and Robin's true identities without using his superpowers. His plan? To use superpowers, of course... but that'll have to wait for Part Two...

In my last post, I noted that Superman considered the story of World's Finest #87 to be the "strangest adventure" he'd ever had with Batman and Robin. After all, it's not every day that Superman loses his powers or some other hero close to him gains superpowers.

No, maybe not every day, but it is close...

It should also be noted that these examples are only taken from issues of World's Finest Comics collected in the first two Showcase trades, a span of 75 issues from #71-145. There are many more stories of this type that take place before and after and in Superman or Action Comics.

Also, to qualify, an example had to be taken from a story where Superman losing his powers was a central part of the plot. Scenes where a thug tosses a chunk of kryptonite and knocks out Superman for two panels were unacceptable.

Two of the most common plots for Superman stories of the Silver Age were "Superman loses his powers" and "Someone else gets Superman-like powers." So when Superman introduces the story of "The Reversed Heroes" in World's Finest Comics #87 as "the strangest adventure Batman, Robin, and I ever had," you can't help but expect a little more than a story where Superman loses his powers and Batman gets them...

... especially since that was the exact plot of "The Super Bat-Man" from World's Finest Comics #77 published less than a year before.

That's not to say "The Reversed Superheroes" didn't offer a unique take on the trope. What sets it apart from all the other times that Superman loses his superpowers is that instead of focusing on how he could save the day despite his disadvantage, Supes decided to get all emo and cry about how much he missed his powers.

When the report of a superpowered bad guy robbing a Metropolis bank comes into the Daily Planet, Clark Kent suspects someone is faking. But when the thief rips the vault out of the ground and flies away with it, Superman has to accept that it's real. He followed the criminal back to his hideout, where he learns the man's story.

Forget how he got his powers. Perhaps my favorite part of this story is the bad guy's awesome supervillain name: Elton Craig! How much to you want to bet Bill Finger had a neighbor named Craig Elton who kept throwing away his garbage in Finger's trash cans or left his Christmas lights up into April and this was the writer's tiny slice of revenge?

Years earlier, Elton Craig devised a series of crimes he wanted to pull off, but realized he'd need kryptonite to remove Superman from the picture. So he got a job as an astronomer so he could find every meteorite that fell to the Earth and go see if it was kryptonite. One day, however, he found not only the kryptonite he needed, but something even better.

The box is full of pills that Jor-El invented on Krypton, knowing that when he and his family arrived on Earth, they would have superpowers, which they could lose and would, therefore, need to replace--obviously--via magical pills. Unfortunately, in all the chaos of Krypton blowing up, he forgot to toss the box into baby Kal-El's rocket ship.

With the kryptonite on the box keeping Superman immobilized and powerless, Elton Craig flies away, leaving the pills that give him superpowers on the table. I guess since he didn't have any pockets in his Elton Craig supersuit, he didn't have much choice.

Powerless due to the kryptonite, Superman, who is powerless due to the kryptonite, uses his heat vision to melt through a water pipe in the ceiling and create a gushing leak that washes all the kryptonite off the box... and presumably into a puddle on the floor where he is lying. Our hero leaps to his feet and pops one of his dad's super restorative super pills, but that only makes things worse.Thanks to some accidentally ingested kryptonite, we get some insight into Superman's absolute cluelessness as to how to live life without superpowers. Seconds after nearly breaking his arm and face trying to fly out the window, Superman realizes he needs the help of Batman and Robin. How will he summon them? By flying out the window, of cour--oh, wait...
While he waits for Batman and Robin to make the drive up from Gotham City to the hovel outside town where he's squatting, Superman passes the time by struggling to pick up heavy stuff and hurting himself.
Yes, Superman, that's why we normals don't go jamming pins into our fingers. Is this supposed to indicate that Superman normally passes time by poking himself with sharp objects and never realized that was out of the ordinary? Or is he trying to cope with the pain of losing his precious superpowers by cutting himself, but Elton Craig hasn't bothered to have any knives or razors around?

When Batman and Robin arrive, they pop Jor-El's pills and taunt Superman with a rousing game of "flying catch the vault Elton Craig stole earlier." Superman reminds them that a supervillain is terrorizing Metropolis, so they take off after Elton Craig, dragging Superman between them.
Superman is essentially Marvin the Paranoid Android at this point. "Woe is me. I can't fly... and I won't be able to fly for hours. However shall I cope?"

And why did Batman and Robin bother to bring him along? Is it to help identify Elton Craig? Because I'm thinking if you see a supervillain tearing apart Metropolis, it's a safe bet he's Elton Craig. And even if he's not, you should probably stop him anyway.

In fact, when they find Elton Craig robbing a jewelry store, Batman and Robin have to drop Superman safely outside the danger zone lest he be hurt. Of course, when they're distracted by a falling monument and have to let Elton Craig get away, Superman leaps into action with about as much success as you'd expect.
Then Superman becomes Lois Lane to Batman and Robin's Superman, stupidly stumbling into trouble and helping supervillains to get away by serving as a distraction.
After the Dynamic Duo save Superman at the expense of losing Elton Craig, they all agree the best course of action is to find the bad guy's new hideout. However, just as they are about to undertake this mission, a thunderstorm rolls in and lightning strikes the zoo, simultaneously releasing all the animals in a massive stampede. Since only superpowered Batman and Robin can handle that problem, Superman has to find the secret lair of Elton Craig on his own.
What the...? Seriously? Superman, have you ever noticed how Batman drives around in a Batmobile? He doesn't just run all over Gotham City. Furthermore, you have no idea where Elton Craig's hideout is. You just accepted the responsibility for finding it and took off in whatever direction you were facing like Forrest Gump, hoping maybe you'd trip over it.

Meanwhile, Batman and Robin get addicted to the thrill of superpowers.
While they feed themselves to wild animals and court lightning strikes to their chests, Superman finds Elton Craig's hideout and decides to explore it on his own.

And that works about as well as you'd expect.Yeah, I'm not sure "I'll give him a juke move" is the best strategy against someone with superspeed.

Then Elton Craig shoots him.

But, of course, while Superman may be powerless, his costume is still invulnerable and stops the bullet, just in time for Elton Craig's powers to wear off and Superman's to return.

EDIT: I just realized that this story is actually a precursor to another issue of World's Finest that I reviewed two years ago. At the time, however, I didn't find the name "Elton Craig" as amusing, probably because he was just a crook named Elton Craig and wasn't using it as a superhero name.

If the limits of your knowledge of the story of the Man in the Iron Mask end with Leonardo DiCaprio and Gérard Depardieu, you might be surprised to learn that Alexandre Dumas's fictional story is based on the true legend of a mysterious French prisoner whose identity remained unknown even after his death. Historians have several theories as to who the man may have been, ranging from a traitorous general to an Italian diplomat to the illegitimate half-brother to King Louis XIV.

But those historians can have all the theories they want. Dr. Carter Nichols has something better:

Batman, Superman, Robin, and a time machine!

Really, given this possibility, why are there any mysteries left in the universe? What became of the lost colony of Roanoke? What happened to Amelia Earhart? Was the universe birthed of a big bang or did God say, "Let there be light" and will it into being? What prompted single-celled organisms to evolve into multi-celled ones? Who better to figure out such things than the world's greatest detective, his acrobatic teenage sidekick, and an invincible, superpowered alien with jouralism training?

Technically, Clark is right that Dr. Nichols has sent Batman and Robin into the past before--in fact, just three issues before this, he sent them to Baghdad in 955 A.D. where they met Ali Baba and Aladdin. However, Nichols had no idea that's what he was doing.

As far as he was concerned, Dr. Nichols sent Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson a thousand years into the past. Now, as brilliant as the plan of sending Batman and Robin hurtling backward in time might be, the idea of sending a millionaire playboy and the teenager who lives with him is equally insipid. That would be like ignoring a team of astronauts and sending Paris Hilton and Justin Beiber to explore Mars.

Dr. Nichols adds Clark Kent to the mission--because "Paris Hilton, Justin Beiber, and Anderson Cooper: Mars Explorers" makes so much more sense--and sends the trio back to 1696, where they immediately cross paths with the Three Musketeers and D'Artagnan.
What's most interesting about Batman and Superman's insistence that they be sent back in time as their alter egos, is that they shed those alter egos almost immediately upon arrival. The purpose Batman's cowl is twofold. First, it protects his identity, and, second, it strikes fear into the hearts of the cowardly and superstitious criminals of Gotham City who wonder whether he might be some kind of supernatural half-man, half-bat. But by putting it on in 17th century France, it undermines both purposes.

First, by venturing into the past as Bruce Wayne, then interacting with historical figures such as Charles de Batz-Castelmore d'Artagnan and King Louis XIV as Batman, a suspicious coincidence arises. It's difficult enough to explain why it is that Bruce Wayne always disappears whenever Batman shows up in 1955 Gotham City, but at least they both live there and have a reason to be there. How are they supposed to explain that Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson, and Clark Kent all just happened to disappear around the same time that Batman, Robin, and Superman broke through a temporal barrier in the exact same time and place?
Second, as quickly as he dons his trusty tights and cowl, Batman then takes on the persona of Armand d'Athos, putting a wide-brimmed musketeer hat that covers his bat ears and kills any chance of anyone mistaking him for a human-bat hybrid.

Meanwhile, Superman poses as Porthos and the three storm the castle of Pignerol where the Man in the Iron Mask is being held.
But when the rescue operation goes sour, Superman reminds us, it wasn't a rescue operation in the first place.
The prisoner is taken to the Bastille and Superman follows to protect him while Batman and Robin run to get the king, who... is supposed to care for some reason or other...

Unfortunately, Batman chooses the event of meeting the King of France as an opportune moment to lose the musketeer outfit, and King Louis reacts as one might when seeing two masked men leap onto your tenth story balcony--one of whom might be an ungodly bat-man genetic amalgam--by charging at them, sword drawn.
So while Batman undresses, shaves, and impersonates Le Roi Soleil, who he, in turn, dresses up in his Batman costume, word gets to the Bastille that the king is coming. This prompts an execution order since if the king finds out about the Man in the Iron Mask... he'll... care for some reason or other...

Superman, not content to let Batman have all the stripping and impersonating fun, protects the prisoner the best way he can.
When the king arrives, it's revealed that the Man in the Iron Mask was innocent and was framed for crimes committed by the jailer who was trying to kill him... though no evidence is really presented and no explanation for why he was convicted in the first place is given. Instead, King Louis accepts the word of Batman, who he initially thought was an assassin until he was knocked unconscious then woke up wearing tights and a satin bat mask inside a prison.
But that's to be expected. He had Superman there to back him up, and they are the two most respected superheroes in the world... or at least will be 250 years later!

There is no adage about writing older, simpler, or truer than "Write what you know." On a certain level, everyone's first fictional work will be autobiographical. That's because when you strive to describe what your main character is thinking and feeling, you will fall back on your own thoughts and feelings in a similar situation.

Even more so, for a character's actions to feel right in a situation, you need to understand how that situation would unfold. If you are writing about a brain surgeon doing brain surgery, you should observe a brain surgery, read books by brain surgeons, interview some brain surgeons, or maybe even be a brain surgeon to begin with. These simple precautions can prevent an author from writing something like:

Time was against Connie, the world famous brain surgeon, but pressure was nothing to her. "Dr. Graham," the nurse shouted in a panic, "what are we going to do?" "Calm down, nurse," she breathed out soothingly. "Give me that little sharp metal thing and the skull-cracker-opener." The nurse's hand reached over the patient, offering the small chrome thing that looked kind of like an Xacto knife, but different. The guys on M*A*S*H used them all the time. Dr. Connie Graham sliced into the patient's scalp, exposing the skull beneath, which looked exactly like a decoration from a Halloween display. Using a large wooden mallet and a prybar, she opened the skull and found the pink brain inside. "I see the problem," Dr. Graham announced. "It's his periopisitis lobe. I'd better take it out. Nurse, hand me the brainsaw."

Unfortunately, Bill Finger wasn't a millionaire playboy who dressed up as a bat to fight crime in an attempt to find a modicum of vengeance for his parents who were slain before his eyes as a child. This made it difficult for Finger, who wrote nearly all of Batman's adventures for the first thirty years of the character, to "write what he knew."

Further complicating matters is that for Finger to write all of Batman's adventures both in Batman and Detective Comics, to co-create Green Lantern, and to write various other scripts for All-American Comics all while being a notoriously slow writer (according to Jim Steranko), it doesn't seem likely Finger was ever able to leave his desk in a windowless six-by-six room. In other words, he wouldn't have been able to know anything about the outside world, making "writing what he knew" an even more impossible task.

This resulted in the majority of Batman stories from the 1930's through the 1960's making little-to-no sense whatsoever, having plot holes large enough to drive a Batmobile through, and generally being built around the premise of "Batman's got a new gadget."

In "The Flying Bat-Cave," Batman gets a new gadget--I won't tell you what it is yet because I don't want to ruin the surprise, but I will tell you it flies and allows Batman and Robin to carry on all the duties they normally would in the Batcave. I suspect I may have said too much already.

In the story, some mobsters set a trap and ambush Robin while he's on his nightly patrol of Gotham City rooftops and abandoned handball courts. Commissioner Gordon gets a letter demanding Batman come to a bathhouse (not to be confused with a Bathouse) to hear their demands.For those expecting Batman to swoop into the bathhouse and start hyperextending bad guys' joints until they beg him to go get Robin from the secret hideout, screaming those pleas so as to be heard over the sickening cracks of bones shattering, this is a different Batman. A Batman that knows nothing about contract law or public relations.

Instead, he signs the contract and treats it like a big puzzle for him to solve.Oh, Batman, are you going to honor the letter of the law and not its spirit? You incorrigible scamp!

Clearly, Batman is trying to find a way around the agreement he signed, but can't think of any way to "keep from setting foot in Gotham City" that doesn't involve several metric tons of helium. Just off the top of my head, I'm guessing he signed the contract "Batman," which is not his legally binding name. It might be argued that for the purposes of this agreement, "Batman" is his legal name, but if he violates the contract, what recourse can the mob possibly have? Are the crooks going to go court and sue Batman for breach? A contract signed under duress--such as telling someone "sign this or we're going to kill this kid"--is not legally binding. Furthermore, you can't have a contract that protects your right to commit crimes.

Batman doesn't let all that get in his way--or rather get out of his way since he's really taking it upon himself to make stopping crime for the next week as difficult as possible just so he can show off his new toy.This panel made me think of the scene in Dark Knight where Batman drops Eric Roberts off a fire escape and shatters his ankles. The stark contrast of the intimidation that Batman used to keep criminals in abject terror versus the total lack of trepidation on the part of these crooks who seem to think a piece of paper is going to be their ticket to armored car robbing paradise is startling.

Of course, Batman has something up his sleeve... or at the end of a long towline.Technically, Batman doesn't violate his contract and saves the day, but the gang has another plan. By going underground, into the sewers, they can commit crimes and the flying batcave won't be able to see them. Being complete idiots, though, they accidentally cut through both a water main and power cable while breaking through the wall of a fur storage warehouse. Batman and Robin see the big dark block with no running water from the sky and tell all the cops in town to stakeout the manhole covers.

So the crooks, loaded down with dozens of fur coats, jump into the storm sewer to escape to the river. Fur coats are kind of passe these days, so I don't know much about them, but I would have guessed that a fox stole or a mink coat would drop precipitously in value once soaked in sewage and river water.Finally, the mob decides to stop committing crimes in spite of the flying batcave and instead commit a crime against the flying batcave.

Atop the post office, Diamond Lang and his boys are seen stealing sacks and sacks of mail. But once Batman and Robin fly closer, it's revealed that the sacks are just camouflage for an anti-aircraft gun. How they were able to get an anti-aircraft gun atop a government building when they can't even cut a hole in a warehouse wall without knocking out power and water to several city blocks is not explained.

The flying batcave gets bombarded and Batman and Robin have to parachute to safety. At a time like this, with explosions all around and your helium-filed helicopter dome thing about to crash, what thoughts does a teenage boy have about his own mortality?Yes, Batman, better to die here than to be known as a liar. A man's word is his bond! What will the people of Gotham think if they find out we foiled a criminal organization's use of a military weapon to kill us and crash an aircraft into the middle of the city, and in doing so we captured several dangerous criminals who were responsible for a string of robberies in the last week, but that was only accomplished by violating a promise you were forced to make only to save the life of an orphan boy who's only now beginning to blossom into manhood and which was only violated because death was the only other option?Wouldn't you think the people of Gotham City would be more upset if they were told, "Hey, I know the mafia has been robbing and killing for the last six days, but at least you know you can trust Batman to keep his word"? I tend to think they would, but then again we're in an election season where people say things like, "Sure, he'll cut my taxes, provide my family with health care, renew America's diplomatic standing in the world, revitalize the middle class, and get us out of Iraq so we can focus on Al Qaeda and other real threats... but why isn't he wearing a flag pin? I better vote for the other guy."

In the end, though, Batman has yet another technicality up his sleeve. A post office is property of the federal government and therefore not part of Gotham City. Not having violated the contract, Batman and Robin wait five minutes for the one week time period to end and take the bad guys to jail while maintaining the trust of the masses.